Colonial Minter Jerimiah Platt Receives Interest on a Continental Certificate

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JEREMIAH PLATT New York merchant and early coiner. Partially Printed Document Signed, "Jeremiah Platt One page, 8" x 4 ¾". Hartford. March 1, 1779. The document reads, in part: "RECEIVED of JOHN LAWRENCE, Commissioner of the Loan Office for the State of Connecticut, Eight Dollars & 1/6 of a dollar on one set of bills of exchange for thirty six dollars … being for Interest arisen on One Continental Certificate, in favor of Thomas Mumford …. Jeremiah Platt" In October of 1785, Samuel Bishop and three investment partners were granted the privilege of coining coppers by the state of Connecticut. Bishop and the others involved were not coiners themselves, rather they hoped to turn a profit from the undertaking. Soon thereafter, three additional investors and Abel Buell, a silversmith and diemaker and the only partner to actually participate in the daily operations of the enterprise, joined Bishop and the others, marking the birth of The Company for Coining Coppers. The company continued steady production of Connecticut coppers into the summer of 1786 when their operations were suspended and then subcontracted for a period due to a lack of copper. Following this six week subcontract, the original partners again assumed control of the company until it was dissolved and reorganized as James Jarvis and Company in June of 1787. This reorganized company was based out of in a complex owned by mintmaster Samuel Broome, partner of Jeremiah Platt, Jarvis' father-in-law. Platt and Broome, both affluent New York merchant, soon subcontracted the coinage business from Jarvis, expanding minting to three locations: Morris Cove, Westville, and New Haven. According to available records, it appears that the majority of Fugio cents and Connecticut Coppers from this period were coined by Broome and Platt, with the co-founder and diemaker of the now defunct The Company for Coining Coppers, Able Buel, acting as a principal die-sinker.

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